Territorial Agenda 2030, spatial justice, and the social investment turn: a capabilities approach perspective

In recent years, European Cohesion Policy has gained renewed significance amid rising inequalities in the European Union. This paper examines territorial cohesion by analyzing the Territorial Agenda 2030, the current strategic policy document for territorial development, through the lens of Amartya Sen's capabilities approach. It examines the policy framework of ‘A Just Europe’ and reveals theoretical connections with spatial justice, as well as policy-related overlaps with the social investment approach. The Agenda, by adopting a ‘new’ meaning of territorial cohesion, as ensuring ‘a sustainable future for all places and people in Europe’, introduces a human geography perspective that promotes an individual-based idea of cohesion linked to spatial justice and the social investment paradigm. However, social investment policies to date have revealed key limitations, primarily due to their lack of place sensitivity and their narrow focus on employability and human capital. The research question guiding this paper is how the Territorial Agenda 2030, the concept of spatial justice, and social investment policies can be meaningfully linked through Amartya Sen’s capabilities approach. This could enable a future social investment policy to emerge, one that is urgently needed in the current spatially challenging environment of ‘left-behind places’ and expanding ‘geographies of discontent’.